When The New Dawn Breaks
by mysteryandenigma
Summary: The Doctor says goodbye to Clara before he regenerates. A reworking of the end of the Time of the Doctor to change the Capaldi sneeze into something a bit more emotional. Contains Whouffle.


**A/N: Hello Folks! Yes, well, I was bored last night and to a request on Tumblr to write an Ending to Time of the Doctor that had the Doctor actually saying goodbye to Clara and going out full-force regeneration style instead of the Capaldi Sneeze (Which I personally found hysterical). So Here we go! It turned out a bit Darker than what I had originally wanted, but eh, Muse is fickle.**

**Warnings: Whouffle, Slight spoilers for the Time of the Doctor, AND I OBVIOUSLY DO NOT OWN DW JUST MY IDEAS :D Geronimo!**

"Aah!" the Doctor grimaced as he doubled over in agony, bending against his will to the shooting pains that wracked his skinny frame.

"Doctor!" Clara's voice was desperate and broken and longing for a hope that didn't exist, not at the present moment (and perhaps never again for this form). Funny as it was, he remarked to himself (but he didn't laugh, couldn't laugh, not now), it was a near exact vocalization of what he was going through physically at the moment. The thought flew by in an instant, a scattered shard among the billions of angry wasps drawing imaginary battle lines inside his head. It was a bother keeping his regeneration at bay, painfully so. All his body wanted to do was give in to the process, the gentle violence of time and space sweeping his essence away and reforming him anew. He could feel it pulsing on the edge of his peripheral vision, just out of sight, whispering to him sweet comforts and a repetitious mantra to just leave this life and giveingiveingivein. What more did this life matter, he'd succumb Twelve times before, the endless unchanging cycle that was broken and repaired. It was as it was meant to be, the dangerous thoughts clouded his head, and he was so close to regen-... He quickly shook the thought away. There were things he had to do first, words he had to say, feelings and emotions and confessions to get off his chest while it was still Him and not some visitor who took his body and face and warped all his memories until they were no longer his but this strangers. To be himself, just for a little while longer, was worth the pain.

Besides, he thought snarkily, if Ten had held it off long enough to visit all of his entire companion list (and it was LONG, the flirt), he should be well and able to hold it off long enough to get out a few simple words.

"Doctor!" The voice intruded on his inner monologue, impossibly more urgent than before (He vaguely wondered if that was even possible. Then again, she was his Impossible Girl). He collected his thoughts the best he could and weakly pushed himself off the cool metal TARDIS console. He could have sworn it hummed it's disapproval as he did so, but he ignored it in favor of comforting his companion.

"Clara." His voice was barely above a whisper, but it echoed through the room like the shot heard 'round the world. His lips twitched weakly in the ghost of a smile, and his eyes hovered over her form, taking in the smallest details: the usually impeccable hair with strands out of place (still beautiful, however, he admitted. Always beautiful); the bossy, little nose and cheeks - dotted comically red (from the chill, he deduced, after all it wouldn't be Christmas without the snow) against the pallor of her skin; the fresh tears tracing mini rivers along the dried riverbeds of salt streaking down her face. How many had she shed today? How many were for him? How many had he caused? (He secretly wondered what they would taste like against his tongue. Would they hold a piece of her?). Her mouth was open in a plea that was swallowed by the knowledge, which bore a burden of silence on her tiny frame.

He moved as if to embrace her.

To late, he let go of the console, nearly falling gracelessly to the floor by her feet, saved only at the last minute by a reflexive hand striking the floor in front of him. His hand. He stared at it in puzzlement, knowing he should be feeling, sharp, stinging pain, and instead feeling nothing. The contrast between what should and what was was, to say the least, unsettling. He shook the feeling off, and wiped his hand, quickly glancing up at Clara to see her standing there, reaching out to grab him, to touch him and pull him up-

"No!" He gasped (in his head is a pleaded yes, but he can't risk it, can't risk hurting her), "Don't- Don't touch me!" He stuttered out. "It's dangerous - regenerative energy-"

Clara paused at that, hand a millimeter away from grabbing his suit, pulling him up and into the light of a new dawn. A millimeter away, infinitesimally close, yet endlessly far. A universe apart. She stared into his eyes (was it he who had once said eyes were the doorways to the soul?), searching, looking, yearning, fearful. But not of him, he realized, with a shock. No she wasn't afraid of him.

She wasn't afraid of the crazy old man in a young man's facade, who had come to her looking for someone else who shared her face, with whom she'd run off with to see the universe, who pushed her into situations where she could have died, for whom she had died -over and over and over again- to save him. No, she wasn't afraid of him, this mysterious, impossible girl- but for him. And somehow, it made that moment all the more important.

"Chin boy?" She whispered, her breath caressed his face, a spot of warmth amongst the chill of another death, another life not quite wasted, not yet. Her eyes were aglow in the murky light, burning in fierce concentration, her trademark stubbornness to the last.

"Yes?" He questioned softly, because aside from the fierceness in her eyes, aside from the questioning looks and the fear he had seen in there, there was something else, a pain and sorrow and open wounds cut over old scars of loss and abandonment.

Wounds he had caused - he realized with a twinge of sickness in his stomach - as certainly as if he had held a knife in his hand himself. Every time he left her, every time he had used her, every time he had pushed her away when she reached out to comfort him - another wound drawn into her soul, justified by knowing that seeing her broken body would be so much worse than never seeing her again. Even so, as time had passed between them it was harder and harder to keep his feelings out of his actions, harder to be unselfish and let her go - back to a family that loved and cared, back to a job, and a school, and friends - when all he wanted to do was hug her tight and never let her go. He wondered now what mixed messages he must have sent, because contrary to his appearance and his actions he wasn't blind to the way Clara followed him, looked at him with curiosity and amazement and awe, not blind in the fact that he soaked all of it in, all of her adoration filling him up with joy and grins that burst to the surface at unexpected times. Of course, that's why he left her for such long periods too, he couldn't let their relationship slip, faltering into a mere something more, because then the consequences would be all the more dire. So he pushed her away and locked up his feelings inside, ignored the pangings of loss, until they were almost unbearable, and then he would run back like a lost puppy into the safety of her presence and fly off, dragging her with him that time.

She never mentioned anything strange, ignored his erratic behavior for the most part, and didn't press and for that he was thankful. Staring a those nonphysical wounds, he wished to touch, to soothe, to caress, and he wondered if the damage he'd done was repairable - could her broken soul be fixed, fixed to forgive him, fixed so that she could see him as more than the the Doctor, more than her friend, more than her confidant.

Fixed to perhaps love him as he loved her.

"Oh, Chin boy," she chastised, and she shook her head to unsuccessfully hide the fear clouding her eyes. She leaned in closer, not quite touching him, but he could still feel the heat from her skin burning his own, a dangerous fire held barely at bay by the confines of his skin. "Shut up."

She closed the distance suddenly, giving him no time to react or shelter her, as she grabbed him by the lapels, hands ghosting over where the bowtie wasn't - another symbol of the changing times (giveingiveingivein) - and pulled him to his feet.

He wasn't sure who initiated contact first, but the Doctor knew both of them wanted it, both of them needed it, needed it more than oxygen, and suddenly their lips were locked together, crashing, and fighting, and giving and taking. It was a shouted plea for forgiveness, recieved and accepted all in one, and with it fire raced through his body. For the first time in forever, he knew what to do with his hands, placing them behind her head and drawing her closer, he needed her closer, he needed her.

And he had her and this time he wasn't going to lose her. It was his second chance - She was his second chance. And he wasn't letting go.

Just like neither knew who started it, the kiss shared a mutual ending too. One second they were perfect together, the next they were both pulling away, torn by obligation and sadness and dim foreboding.

"My Impossible Girl, my Clara." He mumbled into her hair as he hugged her tight into his chest, shirt wet from the sobs that wracked her frame. "Promise me, something, this me, not..." he trailed off to keep his voice from cracking, swallowed and tried again. "Promise me you won't leave."

A look of indignation crossed her face as she looked up at him. It was so outrageous he nearly laughed.

"Of course not!" She searched for the right words to say (so many things to tell, but too little time left). "You're the Doctor. My Doctor. How could I leave?"

He gazed sadly down at her.

"No," she said, her voice breaking, "Don't give me those puppy-dog eyes. I know you're changing, but it's still you, it's always you!" She protested in quiet hysterics. "I've met you - previous you's - and they are still you, I'm not leaving. You can't make me - not again!" Steely determination flashed across her face as she planted her feet as if to emphasize the point.

He shook his head in protest. "Clara, it's not going to be me, it's going to be him-"

"Him is still you and tha-hey!"

She was cut off as the Doctor suddenly pushed her away and stumbled back, concealing panic-stricken look on his face, in a last ditch effort to protect her.

"Doc-" She moved to rush toward him, worry lines etched into the fabric of her being, but before she did so he cut her off.

"No! Stay back." He grimaced. "I mean it Clara, I'm about to regenerate, if you come any closer the energy will kill you, just please, stay back, behind the console. The TARDIS will protect you." (He doesn't want her to see this).

She stood there looking lost for a moment, before looking him straight in the eyes.

"I promise."

Upon these words he closed his eyes, both as a way to not see her leave, but to stop the tears threatening to come (wouldn't it just be easier to giveingiveingivein no more pain). And he was amazed. For the first time in centuries, there was peace in his soul.

He was close now, the tide of energy threatening to sweep over him, but he held it at bay a little while longer.

All the companions he had lost, people he had failed to save, creatures he had killed for the sake of killing, all the darkness - and then the one spot of light, Clara, his second chance.

"Clara," Her name nearly died on his lips.

"Clara Oswald. My Impossible Girl." My love.

(You save me, I save you. That's what friends do.)

"Thank you."

And with that he let go, falling through the vortex at a billion miles a seconds and yet grounded all the while. New DNA and personality and emotions swimming through his veins, and one single thought holding him through as a pillar of golden light swept him up and suspended him, changing him-

Clara.

Pulling him finally towards the dawn of a new day.

Fin.

**A/N: So… You see that little…tiny…button down there… It might say review? Could you waste 10 seconds of your time to click it and tell me what you thought? Much appreciated! Thanks! :)**


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